I want to say that’s the last time I’ll ever listen to you, but we both know that’d be a lie.

Timeline/World: Through the Looking Glass – Atheria 1st Generation
Current Date: June 4, 2059

Character: Taliesin Kaminari
Race: Demon – God of Fate
Age: 4 407, physically about 28
Current residence: Atheria City, Eresiel
 

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There are days when I would like to yeet my sister right out of the stratosphere. But then I remind myself that while we are family, I don’t have to spend every waking moment of my time with her and if she annoys the ever-living hell out of me, I can just sort of walk away and let her have her laugh. Because that’s what this is about most of the time.

The rare times we’ll cross paths unprompted—family gathering, holidays, all those fun, fun things—she’ll usually have a witty remark for me and I often find myself just on the edge of desiring to tell her that this encounter will be the last one of which I’ll listen to her, but we both would know that to be a lie.

She still is my flesh and blood, she’s my twin in age, if not in name, and we both went through similar issues when we were granted our gifts. Sure, there were quite a few differences since there is nothing to her own gift that mine has anything to do with, but it still was an unprompted gift for both of us and learning came with that gift.

Unprompted seems to be my word of choice currently. I don’t even know where I picked it up from. I imagine it has to come from Aurore; I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case. You would think her attached to knowledge more than thunderstorms for all those fancy-schmancy words she likes to throw at me when we do meet. Those words don’t come only during our unexpected meetings, she seems to find amusement in using words around me that she thinks I might not know.

The joke’s on her, I might be brute and brawn more than brains, but I’m not that much of an idiot and most of her—playful, I know—insults don’t fall into a misunderstood mess. Just a few days ago, we crossed paths at the market. I was heading out, she was heading in, and she made a snarky comment about what I was bringing home, I might have very well made a snarky comment right back about how I’d have to make sure to have a leash and collar on hand next time I saw her to make sure she didn’t get lost again.

Don’t you love the way sibling relationships work? It’s a wonderful sort of thing, let me tell you. I know that we’re a special case, especially considering that her snark only comes on because it’s me. I know she’s a sweetheart to everyone else and, on the same note, I know she’s not always a bitch to me. It just so happens that I bring that out in her, the way I bring it out in most people. It’s just part of who I am, and I’ve made my peace with that a long time ago.

I am tempted to drop off a collar and leash in the system, though, let it end on her end and let them figure that one out. Then, I remind myself that I don’t know that side of my sister that way—and I have no desire to—and for all I know, they’d end up making use of these things and imagining that just rubs me wrong. And even just saying that is wrong. I don’t even want to think about anything rubbing anything else in any way whatsoever when it comes to anyone other than Thad.

Maybe I’ve gone soft. It wouldn’t be all that surprising and it wouldn’t be the end of all things. I know that my behaviour for most of my life came from emotional issues I just couldn’t handle and while it’s easy to blame that now and I’d like to claim that I deeply regret my behaviour from once upon a time, I don’t really. Not for the most part, in any case.

While not everyone who has been on the receiving end of wonderful lil’ ol’ me deserved it, I still believe that most of the ones who crossed my path and met with my wrath—figuratively more often than not, that very word—deserved it. I wouldn’t change that at all. I am as I am, if people don’t care for me, they don’t. It hardly bothers me anymore. I have in my life the one person who matters—along with the family that came with sharing my life in this way—and that’s all there is to it. I’m not about to go wet-eyed over something that happened in the past and that I wouldn’t even be able to change, anyway.

What would be the point?

Final Word Count: 785

Maybe all I wanted was the truth. Have you considered that?

 
Timeline/World: Through the Looking Glass – Atheria 1st Generation
Characters: Taliesin Kaminari
Race: Demon – God of Fate
Age: 4 404, physically about 28
Current residence: Atheria City, Eresiel
Final Word Count: 719 words
 

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I think that there are things that possibly shouldn’t be remembered. One of them being the argument I had with Riverae’s mother long before he was even a dirty little thought. Not that he actually ever was. Kiddo was an accident through and through and I admit that I amused myself by reminding him of that often enough. I was in a bad place for too long and yes, I took it out on him, and others and I’ve seen to apologizing. Shocker, right?

Yes, I know how to apologize to people but, most of the time, that’s like pulling teeth and only a handful of people get easy and genuine apologies out of me. I’m not getting into that, there’s no point.

The point is that somehow, I’ve remembered this discussion I had with the kid’s mom some hours before I did the one thing I never did again. I don’t know how I even let myself be swayed into her bed. I’d known all of my life that women didn’t hold my interest and yet somehow, that happened. I mean, it’s not a bad thing. I had a good kid out of it—don’t tell him I said that.

For all I remember of it, I didn’t know her that long. I’d crossed paths with her a few times over the course of the day and I suppose that her behaviour was curious to me, so I did approach her, and we did talk.

She wasn’t really sane. That much I realized fairly early on during our talking. She was constantly mumbling under her breath about wanting to know the truth and hoping that someone would just tell her that much and that she didn’t think anyone ever considered the option and, you know, it was a mess.

So don’t ask me why I did what I did. I just sort of did. It wasn’t a great time in my life. I was aimless, I was alone, and I needed a distraction, and her brand of crazy was just enough to make me want to poke the caged lion. It’s amazing the kind of thing you can get out of people like that.

That’s not to say I went full evil on her, that’s not the kind of person I am. Oh don’t look at me like that, I’m more than aware that I’ve been an arsehole for more than four millennia, but I had my reasons, even if they don’t seem to be valid for most people out there. They were valid for me and that’s all there is to that one, so eat shit.

To be fair, I think that she got as much out of our time spent together as I did. Of course, she did get a little more—a little more that I had to take away from her some years down the road for his own safety and I know how that sounds. I’m the dangerous one, how could his mother pose a danger to him? Don’t ask, you wouldn’t want to know the answer I’d have for you. I just know that I did what I had to.

Just like I did what I had to after the dark years. I didn’t go at it in a nice way but that’s one of those things and it’s fine. He didn’t die and he even got better than he’s always been, so that’s a win.

I don’t know why this memory of her just cropped up today. It’s not as though I was looking through anything that could have triggered but it is one of those things. It’s not a terrible memory though it isn’t an exactly fond one as the idea of bedding a woman for any reason just makes me feel pretty damned grossed out right now. I was at a really low point in my life to have let it happen.

Though, again, I have no regrets as far as that’s concerned. The kid is a good person and while he didn’t have it easy for a fairly long while, I’d like to think as a result of my less desirable activities, it didn’t turn out so bad, all in all.

I’m sure that by tomorrow I’ll have mostly forgotten that particular memory again and it’s for the best.

Don’t trouble yourself. Let the mystery unfold.

 
Timeline/World: Through the Looking Glass – Atheria 1st Generation
Characters: Taliesin Kaminari
Race: Demon – God of Fate
Age: 4 403, physically about 28
Final Word Count: 662 words
 

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I don’t think it needs repeating anymore that I am an absolute asshole. Or, well, I used to be much worse than I am now; that’s no lie. I suppose that after being able to have my heart essentially returned to me after nearly four thousand years of refusing to even acknowledge I had one and it was missing, things will change.

One of the things I was sadly quite good at, while at while I was alone out there and roaming, was causing misery to others; it made me feel better about myself and it brought a sort of twisted glee into my life. A glee I found myself needing because I just couldn’t manage anything else to cope with things. You think that needing four thousand years to cope with someone is a long time? Yeah, I hear you. Makes you realize how deeply I needed this man, his heart and his soul in my life.

Though it feels like quite forever ago, I remember one time, I was somewhere down under. I can’t recall the exact place since it took place so long ago but I know that I was in one of the places that only the Aboriginals seemed to know about at that point. I don’t know that this knowledge ever did reach any others and that might have been fine. I was a wanderer; I could make it to places that no one else seemed interested in.

I remember being surrounded by mainly men; the women were off doing who knows what else. They were talking in a language I possibly should not have known—I am a demon by birth and was gifted Fate later on, I am not one who knows the languages—but I suppose that being attached to Fate, I was meant to be able to understand those near me. I think it is more case that my brain was translating things in its own way without me truly knowing the language at all.

They were talking about how there had been an odd light in the sky and loud crashes a week or so back and they were trying to understand just what had happened but personally, I was more into the mindset that they shouldn’t have bothered or troubled themselves with the whole thing; letting the mystery of it unfold itself would have done the job just fine.

I was aware that the meteorite that had crash-landed into their area just that week back, it might or might not have been my doing. They were meant to discover it and it was supposed to change their lives together but these men—and women—weren’t so easily tempted by Fate; I remember all too easily just how hard it was to achieve any pull with these people. They were the first and last to resist me and it confused me as much as it oddly enough endeared them to me. It was different that someone could essentially resist the pull of fate.

I don’t remember much else from these people. My stay with them was short—a month or so, I think—and after that, well, for a long enough while, I more or less forgot they existed at all and I know that this is how they liked things to me. They needed their anonymity. They needed people to not be aware that they were there. They liked living their lives as disconnected from the growing civilization as they possibly could and while, yes, I’d first gone there to draw civilization in, I realized quickly enough that they weren’t meant for that.

Few have ever managed to get that type of reaction out of me, too few. Nowadays, I’m more preoccupied with finding a good and interesting book to read. I suppose you could say that I’ve gone soft, in a way. I don’t mind that much; it feels nice to not be trying to tear people’s lives apart.

I won’t let you make me doubt myself. Not again.

 
Timeline/World: Atheria – 1st Generation
Characters: Taliesin Kaminari
Race: Demon – God of Fate
Age: 4 402, physically about 28
Final Word Count: 593 words
 

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No one said I was ever sane. Not completely so. I think that losing the one person you were certain you were meant to be with, would break anyone. Especially if you’d already lost that person twice. That’s one thing I’ve never liked as far as mortals go. Before I was gifted with godhood, I wasn’t mortal, not really. There was a timer on my life, sure, but it was thousands upon thousands of years away. There were other ways to end my life as well but that’s beside the point.

Mortal lives are fragile; they die quickly and can’t hold themselves together very well when wounded.

So after losing him not once, but twice, when I was granted godhood, I let myself become bitter. I let myself turn away from the ache in my chest; I let myself be swept up into making those around me miserable at any chance I got. I’m quite certain that the powers-that-be regretted their decision to grant me godhood, especially when it was tied to Fate.

Now and again, I crossed someone who would remind me of him but I refused to linger, I didn’t want to doubt myself, doubt my sanity, doubt my heart. I couldn’t take another set of short, meagre years wanting him but being unable to keep him with me.

There are things I don’t share, not easily. Not to my sister, not to the man my soul is now bound to, no one.

The time I spent with Nikolai was for my own sanity. I felt that he was alive again, that this lifetime was going to be our final chance for a lifetime together but I didn’t know why and I didn’t want to face it, not until I knew why it was out final lifetime together. The time I spent with that Myrias woman, well that is something else entirely and that she gave me my first child is something I don’t take lightly. I might not have treated him well but I’m also the only one to blame. I refuse to apologize more than I already have and it’s been decades, it’s too late for more.

So when he entered my life, arrogant and perfect and almost exactly as I remembered him more than four thousand years ago, I had to fight it. I still couldn’t understand how this was going to be our final chance together but I let myself be pulled in, little by little, until he was mine as much as I was his. I hadn’t wanted his mortal life attached to mine and it took far too long for my mind and heart to latch onto the fact that by living right here with me, with us, he wasn’t going to be mortal, he wouldn’t be leaving my side, this would be our final life together.

I embrace wholeheartedly this knowledge. I’m an asshole; I’m not going to deny that. I’m a twisted jerk who liked to do things the hard way and that didn’t work out so well for everyone and yet, those who were concerned have made it this far, so who is going to complain, truly? I believe that everything is as it should be and perhaps it is time to let him know about the past, about the prior two lifetimes we’ve shared and the hundred or so others I have avoided him at all costs. Let him be mad at me if he needs to be, it won’t change things but at least I’ll have come clean.

The more you experience it, the more you get used to it.

Timeline/World: Atheria 1st Generation
Characters: Taliesin Kaminari
Race: Demon – God of Fate
Age: 4 400, physically about 28
Final Word Count: 541 words

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I would like to call bullshit on this particular not-fact of life. Sure, it can apply to plenty of things but just the same, it doesn’t apply to a whole world of other shit. Take nightmares, for example, the kind that repeats themselves over and over again, usually based on a past life experience that likes to cling the fuck away to you because it can. These nightmares? They’re bullshit. The more you experience them, the more you want them to be over with. You don’t get used to them, you just can’t.

In the cases of certain folks, this asshole included because yes, I know I’m an asshole—or used to be, my sister would say with an amused twist to her lips—these nightmares have physical reach into the world of the waking, so experiencing it again and again? You’re still not going to get fucking used to it.

I didn’t get fucking used to it.

Thankfully, I don’t actually get that particular nightmare anymore, thanks to Thaddeus’s presence and patience. Not that I would have said that after I’d just met him but fools are the only ones out there who never change their mind and I’ve changed my mind for the better.

See, in this case, the more I experienced his presence at my side, the more I got used to it, the more I wanted more of it and look where that got us now; a lovely daughter. Mind you, I appreciate my first born just fine and I wish him no ill will, at least not anymore, but this daughter was planned and prepared for and everything I couldn’t be for River. I was pretty sure I’d have won ‘Worst Dad Award’ for every year of her life but I think I’ve done well enough in that case.

So sure, there are some things that, the more you experience them, the more you get used to them and the more you might actually even get to enjoy them but in some cases, the opposite is very true and the more you experience something, the more you’re going to hate it, wish it would die and wish you could die with it.

That nightmare? If it ever were to surface again, I think I would lose my mind, it was that bad. I’m not easy to rattle but this was enough to do it. It doesn’t help that as time went by and Thad became a part of my life, that nightmare shifted to include him and not in any way that would have made the nightmare easier to handle, it was the opposite, to be honest and that alone was enough to make me lose my shit even more, until those needing to intervene did.

I don’t even know why I’m going on about all this. I just saw this one statement in a book I’d been skimming and it made me want to rant and rave. I guess I’ve mellowed out something fierce over the years because my ranting and raving was a lot more in-your-face than this before. Can’t be a bad thing, still have my mate and our daughter comes by often enough, so I guess all’s well. Mostly.

Denial

Timeline/World: Atheria 1st Generation
Characters: Taliesin Kaminari
Race: Demon – God of Fate
Age: 4 400, physically 28
Final Word Count: 515 words

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This certainly was not happening. It was not happening and they were not staying and just, no. I don’t care what they say, this thing was not dignified though I was more than a little aware that I was overreacting, I didn’t care.

I was not born immortal. I was made immortal, like my sister, our cousins and the other. The only true immortal born that I know of is Vivianus. Angels are immortal by birth but it’s different. Some would say it’s not but it is, so neh. That being said, without the shield that keeps all young, I would not age, so why is it that these silvery blips of ugly hair have been cropping up along my temples lately? It makes no sense, they do not belong there and just should not be, they will not be. I’ll pluck each and every one of them.

I am not old. Well.. for a human I am old, being well over four thousand years of age but I am not solely human, I am immortal, gifted with godhood, I am not old. This body, in its physical form as it is now, is probably somewhere in its mid thirties, I guess? I can’t tell, age has always been a difficult subject for me to dig through. I can tell a child from a teen, a teen from an adult and an elderly person from an adult but between these stages, it always has been fuzzy and it’s my own fault, but that’s aside the point.

I cannot have silver hair. It makes no sense, it does not exist on a scale of should-exist and should-not. That is all there is to that point and that will not change. No amount of staring at them will make them seem any more real and that means they are getting plucked every time one is foolish enough to crop up. End of that discussion.

I know I’ve been stressing over these stupid things, they don’t make sense. I don’t know if the heartburn that cropped up with them is because of that but it’s been unpleasant and chewing little herb tablets does not help. That might just be me though, in the case of natural remedies, it is hit or miss and some might work one day and not the other. I imagine that might be my gift working against me but there’s nothing I can do about it.

So I guess I’ll deal with this evil thing that is silver, it clashes I tell you, as they crop up and just sort of.. go with the flow. I should be used to this by now, going with the flow is what my life has always been about, it what I am. Sure, I can pluck a few strings and change them but I’ve learned to stop trying to control everything and just give it a chance to be.

I’d also been doing well, at least up until this day, this is different and there’s not going to be any going with the flow with this shit.